Azula woke up and looked around. At first she was confused and wondered why she was sleeping outside and not in her very nice warm and comfortable bed until she remembered what happened the previous night.

Listening in on her father and grandfather's conversation.

Hearing her grandfather order her father to kill her.

And Azula, not knowing what else to do, ran away.

She desperately wanted it to be some horrible nightmare, but she knew it wasn't.

She slowly got up and checked her surroundings. There was no sign of father (which made her sigh in relief) but there were some guards roaming around the area. Azula had no idea if father had sent them out to find her and finish her off, but she wasn't about to stick around and find out. Making sure that they didn't see her, she ran off, unsure of where she was going. All she knew was that she had to get out of the Fire Nation.

Back at the palace, Ozai had just walked out of the throne room, having told his father that the deed was done: Azula was dead. Azulon didn't say anything, only nodding and then dismissing him. As he was walking down the hall, Ozai began planning. He obviously couldn't tell his wife and son that he killed Azula because he was ordered to by his father. That left only one other option: lie. He would make it seem as if assassins had broken into the palace and killed Azula.

Speaking of assassins, he supposed that he should send some of the yuyan archers to find and kill Azula. He had no idea where the girl went, but he couldn't have her wandering around and possibly telling someone about what happened. If word got out that she was actually alive, there was no telling what Azulon would do to him. Lying to the Fire lord was a crime punishable by death. And Ozai knew that his father would have zero qualms about killing him.

Making his way into his daughter's room and closing the door behind him, Ozai quickly got to work. He opened up the window to make it seem as if someone had come into the room that way, burned some parts of the room to make it seem as if there was a fight between Azula and her "killer" (it would look suspicious if it looked like a fight never occurred. Despite being a little kid, Azula would not go down without a fight, even if she was up against someone she had no chance against. She wasn't like her worthless brother, after all) and burned the sheets on her bed. Satisfied, he walked back out of the room and called for some guards. It was time to put his plan in motion.

Ursa was sitting at the turtle duck pond with Zuko, smiling as she watched her son feeding them. Oddly enough, she hadn't seen Azula at all that morning. Usually the girl would have been at the training grounds, but when Ursa went there to check on her and make sure she wasn't overdoing it, her daughter was nowhere to be seen. Thinking that she was most likely with her father, Ursa went to Zuko's room to wake the boy up. She noticed that the palace staff as well as the guards seemed to be on edge, scurrying about as if something had happened, but Ursa couldn't figure out what that something was.

"Mom?" Zuko asked, breaking Ursa out of her thoughts.

"Yes?"

"Why does everyone seem so….busy this morning? Did something happen?"

So Zuko had noticed it too, then.

"I'm just as confused as you are. Why don't we see if we can find your father and ask him what's-"

"Ursa," a voice said from behind her.

Nearly jumping out of her skin, Ursa turned around to see her husband standing before her. She glared at the man.

"Ozai, how many times must I tell you to not sneak up on me like that? You nearly gave me a heart attack!"

"I would hardly call that sneaking - nevermind that. I need you both to come with me. Something…. urgent has happened.

Something urgent? Like what? As Ursa and Zuko both got up and followed Ozai, one thought kept on going through her mind.

Please don't let it be Azula.

Ursa's prayers went unanswered. The urgent matter was in fact about Azula. She couldn't wrap her head around what Ozai had told her. Assassins had broken into the palace last night, most likely to kill Azulon. They didn't realize that they had entered through Azula's room, however, and a fight occurred soon after. Unfortunately, Azula wasn't able to fight them off and she was killed.

Ursa couldn't believe what she was hearing. Her daughter was dead? How could this have happened? Why didn't anyone hear anything? For that matter, why didn't she hear anything?! Her daughter was probably scared out of her mind and she wasn't there to protect her. What a failure of a mother she was.

"Let me see my baby. Let me see my baby!" Ursa shouted, turning around to run to Azula's room.

Ozai grabbed her hand and quickly stopped her, pulling her into a hug.

"There are certain things that a mother should never have to see. The charred remains of her daughter is one of them." Ozai said, gently stroking Ursa's hair.

Charred remains?

That was all Ursa needed to hear before she broke down in tears.

Zuko was in shock. Azula had been killed? They may not have gotten along all the time, and he hated that father always gave his attention to her instead of him, but he didn't want her dead. She was still his little sister, after all. The boy ran to his mother and hugged her from behind, tears falling from his eyes as well.

A few days had passed, and Azula managed to get out of the capital without being spotted. She ended up in a small fishing town, filled with commoners. Some of them smelled like fish, as if they hadn't bathed in days. She supposed that she didn't smell much better, however, since she was on the run. If nothing else, being smelly and dirty would make it easier for her to blend in with everyone else. Her stomach began to growl, but she wasn't sure if she wanted to eat the food here. The water surrounding the town didn't look clean at all, and it was obvious that the people here got their fish from the water. As she walked around, trying to decide what to do next, she overheard some fisherman talking about going to a trading port town somewhere in the Earth Kingdom. Azula stopped walking and turned to look at the men. A town in the Earth Kingdom? That was perfect! Her father wouldn't think to look for her there. She waited for a while until the men walked away from their ship to get some supplies for the journey. Not wanting to miss her chance, she quickly made her way onto the boat and hid. All that was left to do was wait until they set sail.

At long last, the arrangements for the funeral had been completed. Ozai stood outside the palace, accompanied by his father, Ursa, Zuko, and some fire sages. They were standing in front of a casket that held Azula's "body" within it. Ozai hadn't asked his guards what they used as a body double, and he didn't care to know. So long as nobody found out the truth, things would be fine.

"We are gathered here today to say goodbye to a member of the royal family, princess Azula. She tragically lost her life fighting assassins who had broken into the palace, with the likely intent to kill Fire lord Azulon. She leaves behind her father, Prince Ozai, her mother, Princess Ursa, and her brother, Prince Zuko. May her spirit rest in peace." The head sage said, before setting the casket on fire. After saying a prayer, the crowd began to leave, and Ursa took Zuko back inside the palace, both of them still crying. Ozai started to follow them when his father stopped him.

"I'm impressed, boy. I never thought that you of all people would be able to think up a convincing story such as this one to explain your daughter's untimely death. You even set up her bedroom to look the part! Looks like you aren't so useless after all." Azulon said before making his way back into the palace.

Ozai scowled and glared at his father's retreating back. One day soon, the old man would meet the same date as his granddaughter. He would make sure of that.

The first week on the ship was relatively peaceful for Azula. She managed to remain undetected, even when she would venture out to quickly get some food. Whenever she heard the crew complaining about how there didn't seem to be enough food, she would quietly laugh to herself, finding it amusing that they never seemed to put two and two together and realized that they had a stowaway on their ship. Whenever she heard someone coming towards the storage room below deck where she was hiding, she would quickly hide herself among the crates surrounding her. It somehow worked every time, much to Azula's relief. At the start of the second week, they had made it into the Earth Kingdom. Unfortunately, however, they wouldn't make it to the port. Nobody had predicted that a storm would hit them, causing the ship to capsize. Azula managed to get herself out of the ship in time and tried to swim to safety, wherever that was. Her attempts at swimming went nowhere, the currents being too strong for her to swim against. One wave was so powerful that it knocked her underwater. The last thought that Azula had before blacking out was that she was going to be seriously pissed off if this was how she died after everything she went through to get this far.

Hakoda stared at the little girl currently resting in his bed. One of his men had spotted a crate floating in the water, with what looked to be a child on top of it, unconscious. She had most likely gotten caught up in that bad storm from the other day. What he couldn't figure out, however, was what in the world was a child from the Fire Nation doing all the way out here in the Earth Kingdom? It just didn't make sense to him. Lost in his thoughts as he was, he didn't notice that the girl was slowly waking up. When he heard a groan, he looked up to see her staring at him with a confused look on her face, as if she was trying to figure out who he was and how she got here. Hakoda certainly couldn't blame the child. He would probably be confused too if he was in her situation.

"Hello there," Hakoda said, "How are you feeling? I'm sure that you must be tired after what you've been through."

No response. And for some reason, the last bit of what he said made the girl look at him with fear in her eyes. Almost as if she was expecting him to do something to her. He supposed that made sense, considering she was from the Fire Nation. Hakoda was sure that she must have heard some lovely things about people who were from the other nations. He couldn't help but feel as if her fear was about something else though.

He would figure that part out later. Right now he had to get this girl to talk to him and find out what happened to her. And what better way to do that than by introducing himself?

"My name is Hakoda, and I'm the chief of the Southern Water tribe. What's your name?"